sports

Araña takes another belt, unconvincingly

by Eric Jackson

On December 2 in Paris Roberto "Araña" Vásquez defeated Japan's Takefumi Sakata on a split decision to become the WBA's new flyweight champion. The Panamanian had earlier abandoned his WBA junior flyweight belt to move up a classification.

For Panamanian fans the bout was marred by a broadcasting glitch that RPC-TV blamed on technical people in France, but wherever the responsibility may lie, we fight fans back here missed most of the fight's first half. Apparently, however, the trend we saw when the signal did come through was also seen in the opening rounds.

Sakata was on the offensive, frequently backing Vásquez into the ropes for some close-range trading of licks. Clearly the Japanese fighter landed the most punches.

The thing is, when Vásquez landed a punch, it was substantially harder than what his opponent was dishing out. Maybe one good indication of the trend was that over the course of the fight Sakata pounded one of Vásquez's eyes to the point that it was visibly swollen --- but Vásquez pounded a one-inch gash under one of Sakata's eyebrows.

This reporter did not try to score the fight, not having seen the first five and a fraction rounds. Had it been limited to what was observed, the fight would have been judged a win for Sakata.

One of the judges who saw the whole fight did see the whole fight scored it a narrow win for the Japanese pugilists, but his two colleagues gave the Panamanian a slight edge. So now La Araña is a champ again, but not very convincingly.